Dear evan hansen the nov.., p.16
Dear Evan Hansen--The Novel, page 16
“How’s that taco? Delicious, right?”
“Evan.”
I love it when she says my name. She sits patiently, waiting for me to trust her. I feel like I can.
“I plan to show him,” I say, proceeding with caution. “I guess I’m just waiting for the right time. He’s been really busy lately, with work, and Theresa being pregnant. Also, they’ve been looking for a new house, and I know they’re really hoping to move in before the baby’s born.”
“Wait. You never said anything about a baby. Boy or girl?”
“Boy.”
Zoe lights up. “No way. That’s awesome. You’re going to have a baby brother.”
“I guess,” is all I say. Because, while I trust her, and I do, I don’t trust myself to talk about this.
As Zoe turns quiet, I realize something: she lost a brother and here I am about to gain one. Maybe I don’t have a right to be bitter about it.
“It hasn’t really sunk in yet, the whole brother thing,” I say. What I don’t say: I wish my dad kept track of my life without me having to always be the one to tell him about it.
“Well,” Zoe says. “You’re going to be the best big brother. And I’m sure your dad isn’t too busy to be so proud of what you’ve done.”
As much as I’ve told her, she doesn’t know the half of it.
• • •
“All this used to be private property,” I say, gesturing around us. “Back in the twenties, there was this guy who lived out here with his family. People assume his name was Ellison, but it was actually Hewitt. Ellison is a made-up name.”
I turn around to check if Zoe is still with me. We’ve been walking the trail for a long time and I’ve been talking even longer. Now that Zoe switched me on, I can’t switch myself off. “Sorry, I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.”
“No, I like it. Keep going.”
“Okay, well, what happened was, there was a big fire at John Hewitt’s house and it wiped out everything, including his wife and kids. He couldn’t bear to live here anymore, so he made some sort of deal with the state to have the land turned into a park in his family’s memory. He asked that it be called Ellison. It’s a combination of his wife’s name, Ellen, and his kids, Lila and Nelson.”
“No way,” Zoe says. “I just got the chills.”
“I know, right? My boss told me that.”
The most remarkable part of that story, to me, is that the guy could have gone with the family name, Hewitt, and that would have included all of them. But I guess he wanted to take himself out of it and make it about them only. It’s unfortunate that more people don’t know who made this place possible and how.
“Do you know where the house was?” Zoe asks. “Where the family lived before they…”
I shake my head, sorry to disappoint her. I should ask Ranger Gus if he knows.
Zoe stops in her tracks and takes a wide scan of the surroundings. “To be honest, I always forget this place exists. Even though it’s right under my nose.”
And a perfect nose it is. Her beauty easily trumps the park’s. “So,” I say, “while I was here all summer, where were you?”
“I worked at a camp over in Riverside during the day. And a few nights at that new yogurt shop on the boulevard.”
I nod, pretending that I never once walked past that yogurt shop this summer after hearing she was working there. “Sounds like you were busy.”
“Guess so,” Zoe says. “I try to be home as little as possible.”
It’s the opposite for me. Or, it was.
Zoe walks ahead. I advised her to wear sneakers today, but I wasn’t picturing Converse. They’re not exactly made for hiking. We’re about to head down a steep slope.
“Careful on those stones,” I say. “They can be slippery.” I want to take her hand and guide her, but with her eyes open she doesn’t need me to, and I’m not sure if she wants me to.
“When I was about twelve…”
“Yeah?”
“I tried to run away,” Zoe says.
I pick up my pace so I can hear her better.
“My parents were so consumed with Connor, like twenty-four seven. I had this plan to sneak into the park with my sleeping bag and stay out here until they came and found me.”
Ranger Gus says there are homeless people who sleep in the park and decamp by the time the rangers make their morning sweeps. The rangers only know this because of what the people leave behind.
“I packed a bag full of supplies,” Zoe says. “You know that movie Moonrise Kingdom? It was like that. Except I didn’t pack a record player.”
She stops at a fork in the trail.
“Anyway, I never actually did it,” Zoe says. “I came outside to the edge of the park and it was so dark in here I chickened out and went home. I slept under my bed, thinking my mom might come to wake me up in the morning and not know where I was. But… she never even noticed.”
I can’t imagine what it must have been like having to share a house with Connor. Like having a tornado for a roommate. It was hard enough for people who shared a classroom or bus or hallway with him. I guess living with that chaos every single day could make the woods seem pretty comfy.
I steer us left before Zoe has a chance to choose a direction. The path to the right leads to Clover Field and the oak tree.
“Hey,” she says. “You know how I was telling you about that open mic night I did at Capitol? Well, I might be doing another one next weekend.”
“You might be?”
“Yeah, I might be.”
“Well, I might want to be there.”
“I might like that.”
A bird whips past us and ascends to the open air. That’s me up there, soaring. I’ve never been this high.
We hear a chirp, but it’s from Zoe’s phone. “My mom,” she says. “She wants me to ask if you have any more emails for her. Sorry, I know she’s annoying.”
“Oh. No. That’s okay. Does she want them, like, now?”
“Not now now. Whenever you can.”
Right. Whenever I can.
To the ground I fall. I can never stay aloft too long. Not when there’s an ugly and heavy truth always dragging me back down.
CHAPTER 18
Today I’m passing by The Zone in the cafeteria and I hear my name. I’m not sure who dubbed it “The Zone,” but it’s the row of tables near the middle of the room where all the notable people in school sit. If an eighteen-wheeler happened to drop from the sky and land on this one spot, the entire upper crust of this school would be wiped out in one fell swoop. (I do happen to know, after reading Macbeth last year, where the phrase one fell swoop comes from.)
Sitting front and center in The Zone is the new powerhouse couple known as Roxanna. Roxanna is composed of Rox and his new girlfriend, Annabel. Poor Kristen Caballero has been banished to one of the outer tables. It’s just natural selection, I suppose. As I pass Roxanna, Rox nods and says, “Hey, Hansen.” Annabel looks me in the eye, which she’s never done before in the three years we’ve been in school together.
All I do is stare back at them in dumbfounded silence. I’m still getting used to how this whole not-invisible thing works. A lot has changed since I made that speech. I’ve finally escaped the indifference of meh. I am now, exclusively, eh. I am Evan Hansen.
I make it through The Zone and proceed to Jared’s table. He’s chomping on a calculator-sized (and -shaped) hash brown. I squat down next to his chair.
“We need more emails,” I say. “Can you meet me after school?”
“Not today,” Jared says. “I have a dentist appointment.”
“Okay. How about tomorrow?”
“Maybe.”
I don’t have time to screw around. As a budding capitalist, Jared knows that it’s a fatal problem when you don’t have enough supply to meet demand. “Unless you just want to show me how to do it,” I say. “I’ve watched you enough. I bet I could figure it out.”
“Oh really?” Jared scoffs. “You think so? Well, be my guest, brother.” A wicked joy materializes on his face. “And don’t forget to add the offset for GMT, or else all the time zone conversions are going to totally freak out.”
Maybe not, then. “Well, can you meet me tomorrow or what?”
Jared straightens his posture. “Sir, yes, sir. Reporting at seventeen hundred GMT-minus-four.”
“I don’t know what you’re saying.”
Jared rolls his eyes. “Five o’clock.”
“Let’s make it four, actually. I have plans at night.”
I leave Jared as he’s savoring his last bite of hash brown and finally arrive at my new home base: Zoe’s table. It’s an eclectic mix of people here. A few musicians from jazz band. A kid from the golf team, which I wasn’t even aware our school had. A mildly, sort of half-committed Goth girl. The backup goalie for the girls’ soccer team. (Ms. Bortel was permanently replaced as varsity coach and gym teacher; apparently she had been caught on video savagely ridiculing, by name, a number of generously proportioned students.) And finally, Zoe’s friend Bee, who as far as I can tell is her closest friend. I’m not positive about that, though, and I get the feeling that Bee isn’t always sure, either, where she and Zoe stand. I’ve learned that Zoe’s opaqueness isn’t only directed at me.
Bee is the first one to acknowledge my arrival. “Are you dressing up, Evan?”
I check my clothing. I’m pretty sure, unless I’m missing something, that I’m dressed the way I’m always dressed.
“For Halloween,” Bee clarifies.
Oh, right. I forgot that Halloween is coming up. “I haven’t decided yet.”
I never dress up. I don’t have a reason to. I’m too old to trick-or-treat and the school has a strict no-costume policy.
Zoe leans over. “We should come up with something together. A famous pair. Bonnie and Clyde. Mario and Princess Peach.”
I look down at her plate. “French fries and ketchup.”
She smiles. I wonder which one of us would be the ketchup, and where we’d go in our costumes, and what it means when she refers to us as a pair. It doesn’t matter what we dress as. We could be anything. SunButter and jelly. Netflix and chill. American Gothic. Whatever it is, for once, I’m in.
• • •
The following afternoon Jared and I are at Workout Heaven. As soon as we sat down, Jared tore into a candy bar and now he’s really taking his time with it, as if purposely tempting the miserable, sweating bastards around us.
“How about this?” Jared says.
Dear Evan Hansen,
They tried to make me go to rehab and I said no, no, no.
“That’s a song,” I say.
“A great song.”
“Change it.”
Dear Evan Hansen,
I don’t want to go back to rehab. I don’t mind the yoga, and the group meetings are all right. But people share some scary shit, like about sucking dick for meth.
“Jared!”
“It happens. I saw it on TV.”
“Take it out.”
Dear Evan Hansen,
I have to find a way to kick this. I don’t want to end up back in rehab. It’s just no fun.
“That’s fine,” I say. “New paragraph.”
“What’s with your arm?” Jared says.
“I just got my cast taken off.”
“I see that, genius. I mean, why do you keep squeezing it like that? It’s creeping me out.”
I look down. It’s true. My right arm is clutching my left. “I don’t know. Whatever. Can we just keep going?”
We fight our way to the end of one email and generate a response wherein I’m being the best friend everyone expects me to be—positive, supportive, generous. It’s a role I’m committed to. When Connor needs a purpose, I give him one. When he’s teetering, I straighten him out. When he’s ragging on his family, I remind him that they love him and they’re only trying to help.
We crank out ten emails. We’re in such a flow that I almost don’t catch one of Jared’s inspired inventions.
Dear Evan Hansen,
You know that insanely cool guy from school Jared Kleinman? What am I saying? You obviously know who Jared Kleinman is. Everybody does. What do you think about inviting him into our awesome friendship and making this thing a trio?
“No, Jared. Obviously not.”
“Why? What’s the problem?”
“You weren’t friends with him. That’s not part of the story.”
“Well, maybe it’s time to expand the story,” Jared says. “It’s getting kind of stale, don’t you think?”
“No, I don’t think that. Not at all. I was his only friend. You know that. You can’t just make things up.”
Jared removes his glasses and cleans them with his shirt, letting his pale stomach wave hello to all of the gym’s patrons. “You’re totally right, Evan. I mean, what was I thinking, just making things up in a completely fabricated email exchange that never happened?”
It’s like dealing with a child. “Just, please, don’t change the story, okay?”
He returns his glasses, businesslike, to his face. “Well, if you want me to redo this email, you’re going to have to wait until next week, because I’m busy the rest of the week, and this weekend I’m hanging out with my camp friends. Or, as I like to call them, my real friends.”
“Actually,” I say, scrolling up the screen, “I think we’re good on emails for now. Let’s call it a day.”
We pack up our things and zigzag through the obstacle course of workout machinery. On our way to the exit, Jared urges me to look over at one of the moms running on a treadmill. I refuse, but he won’t let up.
“Seriously,” Jared says. “I think she’s waving at us.”
He’s not lying. The woman is calling us over to her treadmill.
Against my better judgment, I follow Jared over to the woman. She lowers the speed on the treadmill so she can breathe enough to get the words out. “You’re the guy from the video,” she says. “The Connor Project guy. Evan, right?”
I nod.
“I knew I recognized you. I love your speech. So much. So do my kids.”
It’s crazy how many people the Connor Project has reached. I get emails and messages from people every day from all around the world telling me how their lives have been affected by this thing we’ve built. We started a movement. Touched a collective nerve. And now I’m seeing it in the flesh, beaming on this woman’s face.
I thank her and we finally leave Workout Heaven. “Dude. You’re a hit with the MILF crowd.”
“Stop.”
“Just saying. Honestly, though, I should be getting some of that screen time, too. It’s only fair. How about I do a few man-on-the-street videos for the orchard campaign? I got a dope new camera for my birthday.”
“I think Alana and I have the fundraising thing covered. I’ll let you know if I think of anything, though, definitely.”
“Got it,” Jared says, looking down at the sidewalk. “Hey, I bet Zoe’s happy that your cast is gone.”
“I guess.”
“I mean, talk about killing the mood, right? Having to see your brother’s name written on your boyfriend’s arm all the time?”
“I’m not her boyfriend. I don’t know what we are.” I mean, I’ve wondered about what we are, obviously, constantly, but right now all I have are just wild guesses.
“Don’t even worry about it, bro,” Jared says, removing his car key from his pocket. “The only thing you should be worrying about right now is building that orchard for Connor. Because if there was one thing about Connor, the guy loved trees. Or wait, you love trees. That’s weird. Isn’t that weird?”
By now I’m used to Jared’s blunt humor, but this latest jab feels more brutal than normal. And that feeling only gets validated as he hurries off to his car without me. I guess he won’t be giving me a ride home.
I walk away from Workout Heaven and toward the bus stop, trying not to think about what Jared said and how he said it, but failing miserably. In no time at all, that ugly heaviness returns, spreading through my body, making it difficult to drag my legs along the sidewalk.
And then, in this spiraling state, I feel a sudden chill—the sensation of being followed. I whip my head around and check behind me. But all I find is the empty night.
vi
I’ve been watching him. I can’t help it. What started as curiosity is something else now. In some crazy way, it almost feels like Evan and I really were friends. I’ve heard it said so much, I’m starting to actually believe it. Who knows? Maybe in some alternate universe we could’ve been.
Not that I have much experience in this area. I basically spent my whole life alone. Until I met Miguel. That was his name. Sometimes M. Never Mike.
(I keep wanting to see him, but I stop myself. What’s the point of putting myself through that again?)
We met sophomore year at Hanover. An all-boys school. I thought I’d hate that, but it actually made life simpler. (I’d rate my experience with girls somewhere between Very Unsatisfactory and Not Applicable.) It was the fresh start I needed. In public school, I could never escape the vision everyone had of me. At Hanover, I was new again. Untainted.
No one made me believe that more than Miguel. My first week, we got paired together in biology. I muttered a joke that made him laugh. How do you tell the sex of a chromosome? Pull down its genes. It felt normal, our interaction. What I always imagined normal would be.
He knew a little about everything. Spoke about subjects I’d never considered: cryptocurrency and alkaline foods. Quoted people I’d never heard of: Nietzsche and David Sedaris. Listened to artists I’d missed: Perfume Genius and the War on Drugs. Asked questions I didn’t know to ask: Did the government demolish Building 7 on 9/11? Will humans survive ocean acidification? Where are all the baby pigeons? He could sort out the exact right dosage of edibles to get you floating, as opposed to sinking.
He told me I was innocent. Which was the opposite of how I viewed myself, but something I felt was true in my heart. He saw me before I saw me.
